


The Presence of Absence

by mldrgrl



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Depression, F/M, Introspection, Post Ep: Nothing Lasts Forever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-03-19
Packaged: 2019-04-04 21:21:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14029005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mldrgrl/pseuds/mldrgrl
Summary: Filling in the blanks before Nothing Lasts Forever and trying to make up for what was lacking.





	The Presence of Absence

She has dozens of reasons for leaving, little things she’s collected over the years and compiled into a laundry list of excuses for when the time comes.  Because he always leaves his running shoes by the door. Because he spends too much time cutting up newspapers. Because he forgets dishes in the sink. Because he leaves wet towels on the floor.  Because buffalo sauce gives him heartburn, but he still insists on using it.

 

He is blank-faced when she tells him, and she adds that to the list.  Because he didn’t try to stop me.

 

She takes out her first in a succession of six month leases on furnished apartments in the city.  The first few nights away are a breath of fresh air. A vacation. And then the loneliness sets in.  And the anger. She takes it out on him in sporadic visits to the house. Her nails bite too deep into his shoulders.  Her teeth dig too hard into his bottom lip. Her hands pull too tight in his hair. He accepts the blood, sweat, and tears as though he deserves it, and it makes her angry all over again.

 

She buries herself in work, staying all hours at the hospital because her apartment feels too much like a hotel.  The more she works, the less time she has to feel the effects of living without him. The anger dissipates and leaves sadness in its wake.  Birthdays pass, holidays, anniversaries. Her visits to the house, still sporadic, are filled with despair. She bathes his chest in tears because the gentle tips of his fingers are so breathlessly painful where he touches her.

 

Anger and sadness play a tug of war for her attention in the moments she stops moving so she tries to find other ways to fill her time outside of work, but she can’t find joy anywhere.  It’s not in books, it’s not in her family, it’s not in him, it’s nowhere to be found. She stops visiting the house, but calls instead. He always says her name so casually, like weeks haven’t gone by.  She doesn’t even know how he knows it’s her, because she never says anything, yet hours go by until she’s sated from the sound of his voice and she hangs up.

 

He sends her an article on grief by a woman who lost both of her children in a car accident, which she doesn’t read, but she stops calling him.  She changes her phone number and her email address.

 

She wouldn’t say he’s reluctant to speak with her after a year goes by, but she can tell he doesn’t trust the sound of her voice.  She has no idea who he is anymore or what he’s been doing with his time. For the first time in twenty years, it’s awkward.

 

For reasons unknown, the thought of going back to the FBI, back to the basement, back to the files that she once loved, make her feel openly hostile.  She doesn’t want to admit that she’s been unhappy at the hospital, but the reality is, the last time she remembers ever being truly happy, was with him, alone together in a basement office, just them against the world.  She knows she’s not going to recapture that, but she feels like she owes it to herself to try.

 

It hits her shortly after her mother dies.  After the shock wears off, she feels the same lack of feeling she’s been experiencing for the past two years.  Though it’s been on her mind lately, she starts to admit to herself what she thinks he’s known all along. She searches for the article he sent her and it takes her four days to read it from start to finish because it’s too overwhelming to complete in one sitting.

 

All those little things, the shoes by the door, the towels on the floor, and so on, and so on, in the back of her mind, the annoyance she felt also made her feel like the mother she wasn’t.  Every time she washed a leftover dish or chastised him for eating what she told him not to, she felt the loss of their son the most acutely. She imagined he’d be just like his father. It hurt.

 

She has to call him.  She could probably Google what she needs, but she would rather call him.

 

“Hey, Scully,” he answers.

 

“What is the word for the feeling of the loss of something you never had?” she asks.

 

“How many letters?”

 

“Hm?”

 

“You doing a crossword puzzle?”

 

“No.”

 

“Well, there’s the Finnish word kaukokaipuu, which is the feeling of homesickness for a place you’ve never been to.”

 

“That’s not it.”

 

“The Portugese saudade, which is a deep melancholy for something missing.”

 

“Saudade.” She tests the word on her tongue and then whispers it in her head a few more times.  

 

“Desiderium, the desire for something lost to be returned.”

 

“Tell me about saudade.”

 

“I think the literal translation is something like, the presence of absence.”

 

She very nearly gasps.  The definition hits her in the chest and twists her stomach into knots.  It’s what she hasn’t been able to describe all this time, that she feels the absence of her son as a tangible thing.

 

“Scully?”

 

“That’s what I needed,” she says, softly.

 

“I’ve missed your calls.”

 

“I call you all the time.”

 

“You call about work.  I’ve missed...this.”

 

She doesn’t have to say ‘me too,’ but she thinks it.  He’s had an uncanny knack for reading her mind over the phone since she’s known him.  Someone sighs, maybe her or maybe him.

 

“Everything okay?” he asks.

 

“I’m fine,” she answers.  “Good night, Mulder.”

 

There is a brief silence before he tells her good night.  She hangs up the phone and goes to her desk to pull out one of the few photos of William she has tucked away under paper and pens.  She can still feel the weight of him in her arms and against her chest, his little head on her shoulder and his warm, baby’s breath against her neck.

 

Less than an hour after hanging up on him, he comes to her for the first time since she left, but barely takes a glimpse at the apartment.  She doesn’t give him the tour either, just takes him into her dark bedroom and accepts what he silently offers. There is no lust in loneliness, but the neediness of emptiness fuels the same fires.  She isn’t angry or sad this time, only tired. His touch still hurts, but the ache makes her feel more alive than she has felt in a very long time.

 

He takes her to breakfast in the morning like it’s not unusual to wake up next to each other anymore.  She knows it could be like this all the time, but there’s a part of her that’s enjoyed missing him again when he’s not there, even though she knows it’s only enjoyable because she sees him every day.  

 

Before he drops her off, he takes her hand in the car and laces their fingers together.  It’s been a long time since he looks at her like she’s the stars in his eyes, but it’s been a long time since she’s looked him in the eye.

 

“Anything you want, you know I’d give it to you,” he says.

 

“You don’t need to give me anything, Mulder.”  Off the look he gives her, the one that says ‘I know you know what I mean, so just stop,’ she shakes her head.  “I know.”

 

She looks down at her lap, at their hands resting on her knee.  Their thumbs fight for dominance with soft caresses. He wins.

 

“What do you want, Mulder?” she asks.

 

“For you to talk to me.”

 

“Oh, is that all?”

 

He laughs quietly and squeezes her hand.  They both look out the window. There are so many things she could say, but she doesn’t know where to even start.  He squeezes her hand again and leans over to bump her shoulder.

 

“I didn’t mean right now,” he says.  “I mean, in the grand scheme of things.”

 

“I know that too.”

 

“I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

 

She unhooks her seatbelt and leans over the console to kiss his cheek.  He turns his head and touches his forehead to hers. She nods a little and they rest there in comfortable silence.  Eventually, she gets out of the car.

 

It’s easier than she thought it would be, later that evening, to pick up the phone.  She knows he’s in bed by the deep and relaxed quality of his voice. She can even hear him smiling when he says her name.

 

“Have you really put it all behind you?” she asks.

 

“No,” he answers.

 

“Why did you tell me you had?”

 

“I didn’t want you to think...I don’t know, actually.  It didn’t seem like something to get into at the time.”

 

“How about now?”

 

“I don’t know if a day goes by that I don’t think about him.”

 

“Sometimes I think I can feel him.”

 

“Tell me about that.”

 

“It only started a few years ago.  I mean, I’ve always...he’s always been in the back of my mind, but suddenly...suddenly I feel him right there.  I’ve thought sometimes that if I turn around, I can even see him. Yet, I’ve never turned around.”

 

“Why haven’t you turned around?”

 

“I’m afraid of what he might think of me.”

 

“If you had the chance to talk to him, what would you say?”

 

“Oh God, Mulder.”  She drops her head into her hand and presses her fingers into the sting at the top of her nose.  “I don’t know. I don’t even know. I can’t...I don’t know.”

 

“You should think about it.”

 

“I will.  I should let you go.  It’s late.”

 

“Hey, Scully.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Thanks for calling.”

 

“Good night, Mulder.”

 

Once the door has opened, it stays open.  She starts making regular visits to the house, so regular that he gives her a drawer for her things, and then another.  She insists they maintain a professional front when they’re out on cases, but that doesn’t last long. She’s wasted too much time fighting against what she wants, she no longer has the strength to keep doing it.

 

But, of course, the course of true love never did run smooth.  A few years ago, the sudden and dramatic re-entrance of their son into their lives may have destroyed them, but William is no longer a wedge that drives them apart, he’s a force that unites them.  She can’t truly describe what it’s like when she nearly has her son back in her grasp, only for him to slip through her fingers again. At least she feels a certain sense of peace that some important things were finally said, and heard.  It isn’t really enough, but it’s something.

 

The chance encounter with her son leaves her with new worries now.  When he was a baby, when he was hers, she feared for his safety. When he was gone, sent away to strangers, she feared he would never know a loving family and that he would blame her.  She knows now that he had a normal upbringing. She’s seen the pictures of baseball games and birthday parties. She’s held his whole life in the palm of her hand. She’s not just afraid for his safety now, she’s worried that he doesn’t have food or shelter, about the effects of being alone in the world.  Though she has felt alone, even isolated herself from her family and from Mulder in the past, she was never truly alone.

 

Her dreams of William stop.  She can only hope that the broken connection is due to distance, or because her son has learned to control how he projects his thoughts.  She can’t even believe she considers that as an option. 

 

She starts to spend time in church again, going to Mass and lighting candles.  The mysterious quarter her mother left behind has become something like rosary beads to her.  She rubs the face of it and prays to find strength and guidance and forgiveness, to find her faith in this world again, because she can’t really feel it.  She’s going through the motions, but they’re just motions. She takes communion and reflects on the sacrifices she has made in her life and whether they’ve been worth it.  She doesn’t have an answer.

 

She’s both surprised, and not surprised, that Mulder follows her to church.  As befits her doubts, the candle she’s just lit blows out when she extinguishes the match, and he’s arrived just in time to witness it.  She finds it almost funny.

 

“It must be a sign,” she tells him.  “I’m all out of miracles. Turn back.  Give up. Accept your place in the numbing embrace of the status quo.”

 

He smiles and makes a noise of disagreement as he takes up his own match.  “I will relight your candle. And extend your prayers through mine.”

 

Of course he will.  He always takes up the mantle when she drops it.  It’s something she loves about him. He’ll let her walk away from him, but he won’t let her give up.

 

“What prayers?” she asks.

 

“I can’t tell you, they won’t come true.”

 

“It’s a prayer candle, Mulder. Not a birthday cake.”  They chuckle together for a moment and she looks down at all the rows of flickering little candles, the flames a shining validation that hope exists in this world.  “Prayers aren’t meant to be sentiment,” she says, but she isn’t so much teaching him, she’s trying to remind herself. “It’s a conversation. You can do it like a meditation.  Or, if your needs exceed your grasp, you can ask God to act on your behalf.”

 

He nods as though he agrees when she looks up at him.

 

“But, you don’t believe in God,” she says.  “So, you’d essentially be talking to yourself.”

 

“I may not believe in God, but I believe in you.”

 

She smiles because it’s an answer she expects from him, and then watches his mouth as he continues.

 

“Therefore I speak to him through you,” he says.  “So with the transitive property of equality, if A equals B, and B equals C, therefore A equals C.  Reason and faith in harmony. Isn’t that why we’re so good together?”

 

“Are we together?” she asks.  It’s a ridiculous question, but it’s sincere.  She spends all her days with him and most nights, but permanence is not something they’ve discussed.  He looks hurt by the implication though and she knows he hasn’t pressured her on the subject for her sake, but she does wish he would.  

 

Mulder has been a rock for her, but he always has been.  He’s never made it a secret that he considers her to be his port in the storm, but she thinks it’s the other way around.  It’s his unwavering faith that’s always kept her going. She’s opened up to him more in the past few months than she had in the past, but she’s also held back.  It feels like the time to say more.

 

“You know,” she says, turning her eyes back to the candles.  “I believed I could protect our son, and I failed. I believed we could live together, and I fled.  I gave up on that too.”

 

“If only you’d fled earlier.”

 

This catches her off guard.  There is heartache in his eyes when he looks at her.

 

“Do you know how many times I’ve envisioned that scenario?” he asks.  “Where you left that basement office before I even needed glasses. You’d have your health.  Dog. Your sister. You’d be Kersh’s boss at the FBI and...be married to some brain surgeon with a bunch of kids that you wouldn’t have to give up.”

 

She shakes her head in amazement.  “Mulder, I don’t begrudge you any of those things.  It’s not what I was talking about.”

 

“Well then what are you talking about, Scully, because I don’t know if any God is listening, but I am standing right here.  And I am listening. Right beside you. I’m all ears. That’s my choice.”

 

She doesn’t need to be reminded that he is there with her and for her, but when he says it out loud, like that, she falls in love with him all over again.  She looks around at the empty church, and though no one is near, just a handful of parishoners sitting quietly listening to the choir practice in the balcony, what she’s about to say, she only wants Mulder to hear, not even God.

 

“Whatever we have lost, whatever we have suffered,” she whispers in his ear.  “I would do it all again to be here with you. I lit this candle tonight to ask for forgiveness for the consequences of my choices, but not because I regret them.”

 

She pulls away and lets Mulder digest her words.  She remembers with crystal clarity the night they discussed fate and choice and where all roads lead, remembers because it was the night their son was conceived.  Back then, she was enamored of the idea of predestiny, but she could have always walked away from her fate. She did, for a time, but it’s still led her back here.  If A equals B and B equals C, then logically fate and choice result in the same outcome.

 

“That’s not my four year old self looking for a miracle,” she tells him.  “That’s my leap of faith forward. And I’d like to do it together.”

 

“I’ve always wondered how this was gonna end,” he says.  She appreciates it that he doesn’t call it a new beginning.  She’s been so tired of holding back, she wants it to be over with.  There is irony in the fact that up until now, she had yet to go to confession.

 

Mulder lights another candle while she watches, and then he takes her hand.  “An extra prayer can never hurt, right?”

 

She chuffs and drops his hand so she can step into his arms instead.  He envelops her, but his hold is brief. They need to get out of this church and they need to get home.  She takes his hand again and they leave together. He waits while she dips her fingers into the holy water at the door and crosses herself.

 

It’s a strange and revelatory moment when her wet fingers touch her shoulder.  When she gave her son up, she unconsciously pushed love and faith from her life as well.  She’s been attributing all the blame for her pain onto the absence of her child, but it’s not the only hole that’s been missing.  Her son, her lover, her God, a holy trinity of absence. She isn’t a whole person without them. Just as Mulder once said, he isn’t a whole person without her.  He is her strength, she is his faith. A equals B, B equals…

 

“Scully?” Mulder calls, squeezing her hand to get her attention.  He looks at her quizzically. “What are you thinking?”

 

“Is there a word for the feeling you get when you find something you thought was lost?”

 

“Hm.  Aside from happiness?”

 

“Deeper than happiness.”

 

“Elation.”

 

“Maybe one doesn’t exist yet.”

 

“We’ll Google it when we get home.”

 

His long legs carry him down the stairs a little faster than her, but he stops at the bottom for her to catch up.  She falls into step beside him as quickly as possible because she’s kept him waiting far too long.

 

The End


End file.
